Game of Floods - Foggy Hollow
Homeowner
Assignment: Read the role assignment and background reading below, then answer the questions at the end.
Role Assignment:
You are a homeowner in Foggy Hollow – you’ve lived there all your life. You are proud to living in Foggy Hollow – it’s one of the few areas of town where normal, working people can afford to live and perhaps even buy a home. The flooding issues seem to be getting worse every year, though, and you think the town should invest more in fixing it.
Sometimes, the simplest solutions are the best ones. Your friend also lives along Foggy Hollow river, but upstream in a different town. Her town is protected by a levee – a grassy mound and wall that runs along Foggy Hollow River and stops the floodwaters. You like the idea of a levee for Foggy Hollow.
Example of a levee
Background Reading:
Mississippi Levees: A Curse and a Blessing
Adapted from a story by Rebecca Hersher, May 21, 2018
Mike Stone, left, and Andy Sherman in the pumping station for Hannibal, Mo., during a flood in 1993. The city is protected by a flood wall, and flood managers have built up levees to protect against flooding.
Floods have always been a challenge along the Mississippi River, and recently they have been getting more frequent and more severe. As human populations along the river increased, levees quickly became the go-to solution for controlling the river. After the great flood of 1927, Congress required the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to build a massive system of levees and dams on the Lower Mississippi. More recently, communities in the upper Mississippi have also invested in levees.
Doubling Down on Levees: The Sny
The Sny Island Levee Drainage District in Illinois has run into some trouble over the size of its levees. The Sny raised its levees in response to a flood in 2008, which was the second largest flood ever recorded on the Upper Mississippi. “In a flood fight, you raise your levees at least two feet higher than the forecast crest, and we did that,” explains the drainage district superintendent, Mike Reed.
After the water receded, the district decided to leave the extra sand where it was to protect against the next flood, even though that was against the rules. The federal government sets a maximum height for levees, because overbuilt levees in one place can increase flood problems in neighboring communities.
But landowners in the Sny don’t care that they are breaking the law, even though it means the U.S. Army Corps won’t help pay to maintain the levees. Instead, they pay for it themselves. Mike Reed says the drainage district collects about $2 million each year from local landowners to pay for the system.
According to Reed, the investment has paid off. “We have calculated that since 2001, almost $1 billion in damages has been prevented by our levee system, just in the Sny,” says Reed. “So, it works. It’s difficult, hard work, it’s tough, and it’s 24/7. But that’s what you have to do.”
Crews push extra sand onto Mississippi River levees in the Sny drainage district in Illinois during a flood in June 2008. M. Spencer Green/AP
Life behind levees is less expensive, because residents don’t have to pay for costly flood insurance. When levees are high enough to protect against a hundred year flood – a flood with a one percent chance of occurring in any given year - the federal government no longer requires flood insurance. Similarly, farmers behind the Sny levees are paying half as much to insure fields along the Mississippi River as their neighbors across the river are, explains crop insurance salesman Matt Jones. "It's based on flood risk, and the area behind the levee is considered lower risk," he says.
'They're Sending the Water Our Way'
Not everyone is happy about the Sny levees. Multiple studies show overbuilt levees are increasing flood risk for people on both sides of the river. An analysis released earlier this year found the Sny levees have increased the height of the river during floods, pushing water into towns and farms across the river.
"They're sending the water our way, and there's nothing we can do about it," says Al Murry, the emergency manager for Pike County, Mo. The county has been hit with multiple so-called 100-year floods in the last decade, destroying crops on Murry's side of the river while the other side stayed dry.
Some inside the Sny are also concerned about what would happen if the huge levees ever failed. "Just because you live behind a great, big, strong levee does not mean that there's no chance of getting flooded," explains geologist Nicholas Pinter. "There are two types of levees: those that have failed and those that will fail." Since the people behind the Sny levees are mostly not protected by flood insurance, they would end up having to pay out of pocket if there was a big flood.
Mike Reed, the Sny district superintendent, insists the Sny's risk assessment is sound. "In an excess of 100 years we've had one levee breach," he says. He doesn't agree with data that shows levees increase flood risk. "A model is a theory. What actually is happening, to me, is more important that what a theory says."
Reed say people feel safe behind his district's levees, at least relatively so. But he admits, "Mother Nature is a tough thing to predict."
A sign in a field near Winfield, Mo., during a Mississippi River flood in 2008. The area suffered a similarly serious flood in 1993. The frequency of severity of flooding up and down the river have increased due to climate change and river control structures such as levees.
Questions:
1. How could levees on one side of the river increase flooding on the other side?
2. What are two benefits of levees for people living in the Sny drainage district?
3. Who would pay for damages to crops if the Sny levees failed?
4. Answer this question in character as a Foggy Hollow homeowner (see the role description at the top). Do you support building a levee along Foggy Hollow Creek to protect Foggy Hollow from flooding? Explain your reasoning.
Once you have answered the above questions, move on to Part 2 here.
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